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Mike Huckabee is giving a big thumbs-down to Rick Perry’s campaign rollout, telling Fox News that the Texas governor’s decision to announce on the day of the Iowa straw poll is a big “tackical blunner.”

The problem, said the former Arkansas governor and 2008 Iowa caucus winner, is that Perry’s Saturday kickoff in South Carolina shows disrespect to the Iowa process.

And outside the Capitol, the top Republican leaders, including Chief Deputy Whip Peter Roskam (R-Ill.) engaged in a PR campaign to win over conservative interest groups and opinion-makers.

The Republican leadership trio has privately reached out to conservative TV personalities like Sean Hannity and Brit Hume, and Wall Street Journal editorial page editor Paul Gigot, National Review’s Kate O’Beirne, Stephen Hayes of The Weekly Standard, David Brooks of The New York Times, George Will, Laura Ingraham, Mark Levin, and groups such as The Heritage Foundation, among others, have all heard from Republican leadership. And even former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas), the chairman of FreedomWorks and a tea party favorite, got a call from GOP leaders.

There aren’t many positive aspects to the looming possibility of a U.S. debt default. But there has been, I have to admit, an element of comic relief – of the black-humor variety – in the spectacle of so many people who have been in denial suddenly waking up and smelling the crazy.

A number of commentators seem shocked at how unreasonable Republicans are being. “Has the G.O.P. gone insane?” they ask.

Why, yes, it has.

But this isn’t something that just happened, it’s the culmination of a process that has been going on for decades. Anyone surprised by the extremism and irresponsibility now on display either hasn’t been paying attention, or has been deliberately turning a blind eye.

And may I say to those suddenly agonizing over the mental health of one of our two major parties: People like YOU bear some responsibility for that party’s current state.

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Here’s the point: those within the G.O.P. who had misgivings about the embrace of tax-cut fanaticism might have made a stronger stand if there had been any indication that such fanaticism came with a price, if outsiders had been willing to condemn those who took irresponsible positions.

But there has been no such price. Mr. Bush squandered the surplus of the late Clinton years, yet prominent pundits pretend that the two parties share equal blame for our debt problems.

Paul Ryan, the chairman of the House Budget Committee, proposed a supposed deficit-reduction plan that included huge tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, then received an award for fiscal responsibility.

So there has been no pressure on the G.O.P. to show any kind of responsibility, or even rationality – and sure enough, it has gone off the deep end.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee on Wednesday reiterated his recent announcement that he won’t seek the Republican nomination for president, but declined to rule out accepting a spot as vice president on the Republican ticket.

“Ev’ry thin’ is still open,” Huckabee said when asked afterward about being the potential Republican candidate’s running mate.

He also has made no secret of his fondness for the money he has made since leaving politics for good.

In addition to the Fox News show, he hosts a regular radio show and has writtten several books. Just this week, the best-selling author launched a new venture selling historical cartoons tailored to children. In the opening to his show Saturday night, he taunted critics of the “LearnOur History” cartoons.

Potential presidential candidate Mike Huckabee acknowledged this shift on Fox News today, telling host Bill Hemmer that even former President Reagan, the great conservative icon, would likely be unable to win a GOP primary in the current Republican “atmosphere”:

HUCKABEE: “Ronald Reagan would have a very difficult, if NOT IMPOSSIBLE TIMEbeing nominated in this atmosphere of the Republican party.”

HEMMER: How come?

HUCKABEE: “Because he raises taxes as governor, he made deals with Democrats, he compromised on things in order to move the ball down the field. As president, he gave amnesty to 7 million illegal immigrants. There were many things that would have been anathema. People speak of Reagan as if he was absolutely steadfast. He was in his convictions, but you have to govern in a way that is different that is different than the way you campaign.”

The contretemps started Saturday, when both Huckabee and Michele Bachmann gave speeches likening the United States’ fiscal future to the Nazi genocide.

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Huckabee gave a speech to the National Rifle Association. He spoke of how, at Israel’s Holocaust museum, he looked over his 11-year-old daughter’s shoulder as she wrote in the guest book, “Why didn’t somebody do something?” Then he said, “We cannot afford to be a eneration that leaves our children with nothing but a huge debt and the very erosion of the freedoms that our founders and our fathers died and gave us so valiantly. And that’s why I say, ‘Let there never be a time in this country where some father has to look over his daughter’s shoulder and see her ask this haunting question: Why didn’t somebody do something?’”

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Naturally, the ADL (Anti-Defamation League), which spends a great deal of time fighting those who would minimize or deny the full scope of the Holocaust, wasn’t happy.“It is highly inappropriate to use America’s mounting debt crisis as ANOTHER occasion to invoke Nazis and the Holocaust, particularly on the eve of Holocaust Remembrance Day, a time dedicated to memorializing, not trivializing, the 6 million Jews and millions of others who perished at the hands of the Nazis,” said Foxman.

How about ANYONE with the minimal amount of knowledge about history (Nazis/genocide), or a ‘sense of proportinality’, should be outraged at the comparisons to the budget deficit or Obama’s Health Care.